Better than Expected

Posted on April 7, 2016 by Doc Arnett

Ever have that experience where you find out the name of something is slightly—or totally—misleading? Seems to happen a lot with children’s toys, tourist attractions and fund-raising events. “Big Boomer Quadratrack Remote Controlled Rugged 4×4” turns out to be about four inches long with a battery pack connected by a small wire and the control options are forward and off. “Crystal Cascades Waterfall” is sort of brown and foamy and has a total drop of twelve feet. “Super-Sized Chocolate Bars” weigh a whopping .75 ounces and the first ingredient listed is paraffin. You know, the name itself is basically a lie.

Well, I am happy to report such is not the case with “The Grand Canyon.”

I still haven’t had the chance to visit the big ditch but I did happen upon a short inspection opportunity from about four miles high yesterday. With a few others from Cowley College, I was flying friendly skies on the way from Denver to Los Angeles when I happened to look out the window from the middle seat and see perhaps the most impressive thing I’ve ever seen from the air. I’m not a renowned traveler but I did get an aerial view of an active volcano in Hawaii about ten years ago. I must say based on my two minutes yesterday that the Grand Canyon absolutely deserves its name. Wow!

I can barely imagine the grandeur that geological feature presents from either rim. Given the scale revealed from twenty-two thousand feet, it cannot be anything less than awe-inspiring, and I come from an era when “awesome” meant “awesome” instead of “oh, that’s nice.” The size, the formations, the colors, the sheer grandeur and wonder just about took my breath away. (I am pretty sure that sensation was not due to a sudden drop in cabin pressure.) It took me over sixty years to get my first look and if it takes another thirty for my first hike there, it’ll be worth the wait.

There have been a few other times in my life when the reality of the experience actually exceeded my expectation: being baptized at age twelve, being present at the moment of another’s death and participating in Spirit-led worship.

I don’t suppose we’ll be wearing socks in heaven and it would be a waste of time to put them on even if they were available; I’m pretty sure our first glimpse will blow them off anyway!

H. Arnett
4/7/16

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A Romantic Evening

Posted on April 6, 2016 by Doc Arnett

It had been another day of strong winds blowing across southern Kansas. According to the National Weather Service, a “Red Flag” warning was in effect until 10:00 p.m. For those of you who might not live in a place where you have to worry about the countryside catching fire, a Red Flag warning means it’s a really bad idea to set something on fire. Dry conditions, strong winds and a few million acres of dead grass is just the sort of combination that can alter lives in a really bad direction. Mostly, people who deliberately set stuff on fire during Red Flag warnings are regarded as non-desirable elements in the local culture.

Having lived in a place or two where on a really quiet night you could hear the gene pool shrinking, I try to be cautious about flirting with a Darwin Award. But when I stepped out onto our small deck last night just before ten o’clock, there was almost no breeze at all. Since I was scheduled to leave for several days the next morning, I thought a little romantic diversion was in order.

So, I set the chiminea out on the deck and arranged the firewood in the burn chamber. (You can just almost see the whole story starting to unfold now, can’t you?)

I arranged the lounge chairs appropriately, poured a couple of small glasses of elderberry mead and invited Randa out to the deck. She was properly impressed with my efforts and the fire started up quite nicely. Lovely tongues of flame were soon rising up around the very dry wood that I had cut up from dead limbs that had dropped off a maple tree nearby. We settled back into our chairs, slowly sipping from our glasses and passing the time.

As it turned out, the passing of time shifted into the fast lane. That light breeze turned into a fame-seeking wind. Flames whipped out the leeward side of the chiminea, leading us to suddenly see the wisdom of moving our chairs back a couple of feet. As the wind surged and shifted, pushed and lifted, the flames changed directions.

Apparently, the National Weather Service does not have firm control over the moods of the wind in our part of the country. We decided not to add any more wood to the fire and kept a cautious eye on the deck, the yard and the neighbor’s wooden fence. After twenty minutes or so of something considerably less romantic than my intentions, the fire had died down to coals. Another twenty minutes and the last glow of coals had died into the ashes.

I have learned that not only is caution the better part of valor, it can sometimes also be the better part of romance. No matter how good our intentions, we should never forget that our intentions do not always control the outcomes. Some ideas have far better results in our imaginations than in the conflagrations that sometimes break out in the places where we live and work.

H. Arnett
4/6/16

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Ray Wylie Hubbard & the Secret of Good Days

Posted on April 5, 2016 by Doc Arnett

The first slice of a new moon hangs platinum in the eastern sky as I turn west onto Radio Lane. I look at that promise in a sky the early morning shade of blue that my camera never captures: new morning, new moon, new challenges, new refreshments. A new day.

I wish that I could say that I greet every morning with fresh hope, fresh eyes, fresh expectance of good to come. I like the idea of that and I like the difference in how I feel when I prepare myself to expect such things.

There are in fact those days when I wake with just that sort of feeling. “Thank you, Lord, for this new day.” The words are the first conscious thought on waking. On those days, I pray, too, for grace and wisdom, for making good decisions and bringing good into the lives of those I touch. I pray the same for my colleagues, for the president of our college and others.

I give thanks for the good in my life, for the opportunities I will have, for hot water in the shower and hot coffee on the counter. I give thanks for the people I love and who love me and for those with whom I work. I give thanks for my job and the car that takes me there and back. I give thanks for the woman whose love I see in a hundred different ways from day to day. And on it goes… so much to be thankful for, so much more than I deserve.

I pause here and reflect: I had started off to talk about those other days, but after the list of gratitudes, I’m just not in the mood for that anymore!

My son, Sam, shared with me a quote from Ray Wylie Hubbard who is, I believe, a Texas songwriter. At the end of one of his concerts, Ray said, “Those days when I keep the level of my gratitude above the level of my expectations, I have really good days.”

Here’s to all of us making today a really good day!!

H. Arnett
4/5/16

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Courting Disaster

Posted on April 4, 2016 by Doc Arnett

There are a number of ways that a man can hurt himself remodeling. Some of them sound kind of macho: “Yep, probably shouldn’t have tried to carry that antique refrigerator up to the attic by myself but I really wanted to surprise my wife. Come to think of it, guess I did when I crashed through the ceiling while she was watching TV.” Others, not so much: “I didn’t know you were supposed to point that finish nailer away from your face when you were doing crown molding.”

Over the years, I’ve gained a few scars, lost a tiny little slice off the side of one finger and had what would have been called “carpenter’s elbow” if some folks spent more time driving nails than playing tennis. And there was the time when a neighbor was helping me slide a cast iron bathtub onto a raised platform. I was gripping the three-hundred pound tub under the edge when I asked him if he was ready. Apparently, he was; he gave it a shove and sheared the bone in the end of the longest finger on my left hand. It wasn’t a total loss though; every time I looked at the two metal pins sticking out the end of my splinted middle finger, I thought of him.

My most recent installment involved nothing more than a drill driver with a Phillips bit and a single cement backer board. In reflection, I have to say that I had eased out a bit beyond tempting fate: I invited karma, providence and righteous indignation in one fell swoop.

While Randa was in agony with a migraine, curled in fetal position underneath the covers on a bed in a dark room, I was fastening down the cement board at the entry in the living room, not more than twenty-five feet away. As every screw reached snugging point, the bit would ratchet in the head of the screw. On a healthy, gee what a nice day we’re having kind of a day, it sounds like an impact wrench at the tire shop. With a migraine, it probably sounded like a machine gun firing close enough to give bystanders powder burn. I have not yet confirmed this with Randa; I need to remove all the knives from the house before asking that question.

As if that were not sufficient instigation for divine retaliation, it was also a Sunday. Talk about courting disaster!

About a dozen screws into the project, with me bearing down really hard to try to keep the bit from ratcheting, the Phillips point slipped off the screw and jabbed into the fleshy side of my left forefinger just above the second joint. In order to assure maximum penetration in the event of such an incident, I had my hand braced against the floor. It worked.

Bruise, blood blister and puncture all in one quick operation. A little soap for sanitation, a teaspoon of salt rubbed in for sterilization and ten or fifteen minutes of direct pressure to stop the bleeding. After I got the Band-Aid tightly wrapped in place, I decided to check the bit. Sure enough, it was worn off on the point and slightly smaller than what I needed. I found a larger bit in good shape and put it into the drill.

As further penance, I finished up the project with almost no more ratcheting.

Why is it that guys like me so often wait until after the damage is done before stopping to think if there might be a better way to do things? It’s one thing when all that happens is you get a bruised cut and an embarrassing story. Quite another thing when our mishandling something hurts others: a spouse, a friend, a family, a company, a church…

Taking a little time to make sure we’re using the best tool for the job in the best way is a good practice. Kind of fits into that “love your neighbor as yourself” thing.

And sometimes, maybe the day we chose just isn’t the best day.

H. Arnett
4/3/16

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After the Burning

Posted on April 1, 2016 by Doc Arnett

Just before dusk on the second day
of the wildfires that swept up from Oklahoma
into western Kansas a hundred miles away,

we could see the smoke in the air,
a faint forming of haze in the evening sky
that gave no true sense of where the fires

might be burning.

Later then, after we could smell the smoke,
we could see a giant halo
hovering around the full moon

that rose up from the trees
standing black-stretched
against a muted sky.

We learned later of fields and cows
scorched by the burn,
of houses and barns

turned into ash.

Easter seemed to come
into some sort of dark stench
of sin and shame,

of pain and loss
and awful costs
born by others.

And then on Saturday
snow fell full and deep on the prairie,
a serene covering of blackened earth.

With the dawning of Resurrection Day,
it lay softly against the burns,
soothing the yearning of deeper roots

that will send up shoots of green
in the deepening spring
that follows the sting of suffering.

We often do not know
the fires that burn in others’ lives,
the deeper wounds that anchor scars,

but beneath the smell of smoke
and the feel of darkened skies,
we may know the price

that has been paid for ours.

H. Arnett
4/1/16

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Wisdom Amidst the Flames

Posted on March 24, 2016 by Doc Arnett

One of the paradoxes of human endeavor is that at the times when it is most important to think clearly, it is often the most difficult to think clearly. Crises, emergencies and arguments with teenage children often serve to illustrate this. You’re in a situation, oh, let’s say the roast is burning in the oven, company is due in eight minutes and the eight-year-old has just flushed the three-year-old’s blankie down the toilet. Or maybe it was the three-year-old herself that just got flushed down the toilet. Whichever.

Clearly, the actions you take here are relatively significant, especially compared to, say, picking out the pattern of Kleenex to buy for the living room end table. Oh, by the way, I forgot to mention that the curtains in the dining room just caught fire…

So, being the calm, cool, collected person that you are, you text your spouse to pick up three pizzas on the way home, tell the oldest to begin setting up the picnic table on the patio, throw a pitcher of sweet tea on the curtains and tell the eight-year-old to sit on the curtains until they quit smoking and then you grab the plunger and a coat hanger from the utility closet and head upstairs toward the sound of muffled screams and gurgling.

Good work, there. But had you gotten frustrated and let your emotions interfere with your thinking, your company would end up eating burnt offerings and surrounded by the incense of smoldering paisley pattern velour while the eight-year-old is googling “family services” and the three-year-old has very sticky hair.

Whether it’s dealing with small child infused debacles, exchanging insurance information on the side of the freeway or moving toward consensus with your inner selves in regard to the next big family get-together, there are those moments when calm restraint is worth it’s wait (sic) in gold. The first thing that comes to mind is sometimes the worst thing to say. And though apologies are truly golden on the open market of human relations, they cannot erase memory.

Some of the worst emails I’ve ever written were never sent. That restraint alone can spare lives and extend careers. Some of the most smashing insults I’ve ever thought of were never uttered. Owing to grace beyond myself, I have sometimes said something very patient, insightful and understanding when what I was really feeling was an incredible urge to say something genuinely mean, hateful and hurtful.

As my noble, gracious and smarter than me wife says, “You almost never have to apologize for something you decided not to say.”

H. Arnett
3/24/16

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Not Playing, With Fire

Posted on March 23, 2016 by Doc Arnett

There is a full moon tonight,
rising in the opposite of the sun’s setting:
true west in the quick passing
of the vernal equinox.

It would be pleasant
to sit in the soft shadows
of a fire in the chiminea
on the small weathered deck.

But the wind we hoped
would lay in the evening
is still swaying limbs and branches
and we do not like such chances

with hot coals and glowing embers.

There are things that are good
in quiet times and stillness
that turn dark and sometimes deadly
when other forces rise.

The skies turned black today
in the Flint Hills of Kansas,
perhaps the careless toss
of an almost used up cigarette

or some even more thoughtless
notion of burning trash
on a day when nothing outside
could be set fire and then contained.

We who live on the plains
must be carefully of loosing flame
in the face of dry winds
and swaying grass

else things meant to last will not.

H. Arnett
3/23/16

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Celebrating the Upgrade

Posted on March 18, 2016 by Doc Arnett

Back in the Fifties and Sixties, it had become fashionable to design living rooms without overhead lights. Although the rural parts of the country were just in the second generation of even having electricity, overhead lights in the living room had already become rather blasé. I mean, come on, even shacks and shanties had overhead lights in them! And so, rather than having overhead lights, folks started wiring one or two wall outlets to a light switch. Plug in a couple of table lamps, flip the switch and voila! Lighting in the living room.

I’m not sure how long it was before folks began realizing that a room illuminated only by a couple of table lamps is never fully illuminated. But as people in the throes of fashion are wont to do, they satisfied themselves with the affirming conscious that their living room reflected the latest style and convinced themselves that seeing well in all parts of the room wasn’t really all that important. I mean, how much light do you really need to read the TV Guide?

My wife, however, does not subscribe to the TV Guide and I sometimes read email so we decided it would be an improvement to have an overhead light in the living room. A decision, sadly, neither the builders nor any previous occupants had ever made.

And so it was that yesterday found me celebrating spring break by crawling through our attic on a mission of electrification. The access to our attic is in the ceiling of the garage, a bit over sixty feet away from the installation destination. Our attic is low with only three feet of space above the joists. My effective clearance was about half of that, owing to collar beams spanning. I had to utilize the military crawl technique underneath each of those. I’d shove the small bag of tools I needed forward, crawl forward, shove the bag, crawl forward. And, I had to check before each segment to locate the joists hidden beneath several inches of blown-in insulation.

Then, in order to reach the wire I’d shoved up through a hole I drilled from the exterior wall of the living room, I had to belly my way out to the edge where the rafters slope down. By flattening myself completely against the joists and stretching out as far as I could, I barely managed to reach the wire. All while half-burying my face in the insulation.

I ran the wire, installed the ceiling box and tried to spread the disturbed insulation back into place. Then I headed back through the attic, repeating the shove-and-crawl technique all the way back over to the access hole in the garage ceiling. And along the way, giving thanks. Giving thanks that I hadn’t slipped off the edge and crashed through the brand new ceiling I’d just finished last weekend. Giving thanks for the last few years of mud racing that had given me a good bit of practice in the military crawl. Giving thanks that the insulation I was crawling through was cellulose instead of fiberglass.

And most particularly, giving thanks that just less than three months after my knee surgery, I was doing all this crawling and kneeling without any discomfort in my knee. Even though it’s totally out of my character, I had to admit that finding the good in my situation was decidedly more pleasant than griping about the inconveniences.

And… we now have overhead lighting in our living room.

H. Arnett
3/18/16

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Sixteen-Penny Insanity

Posted on March 17, 2016 by Doc Arnett

There’s something about the sound of a squeaking floor. In a suspenseful movie, it’s a foreshadowing of something foreboding: something really bad is about to happen to someone. In a home with small children, it’s an indication someone is sneaking into the kitchen or that someone can’t sleep or is feeling sick. In a home with teenagers, it might be a tell that someone has come home after curfew.

Some people take it as a given in an old home. Floorboards shrink and separate, some space forms between the subfloor and finished flooring, nails loosen and things move and the sound of wood moving against wood becomes part of living in that house. To me, there’s something warm and comforting about it, something that speaks of years of living and bearing the load of love. The house communing with its dwellers.

Nothing of this world stays new forever and all that gives itself to some good purpose eventually bears witness of that giving. Faces wrinkle, lines grow deeper, even stones wear smooth on their edges. And floors begin to creak.

For some, that creaking has a very different effect. It’s annoying, irritating, aggravating. And for at least one previous inhabitant of this particular house, apparently maddening.

I don’t know if it was a matter of free nails and cheap beer or free beer and cheap nails but it seems obvious that abundant quantities of each were involved.

This house was built in 1967 and furnished with solid oak flooring throughout the dining room, living room, hallway and bedrooms. Lovely stuff, oak flooring. Durable, beautiful, sensible and solid. It can last for hundreds of years, barring water and termites. But at some point, somebody in this house absolutely lost it, went stone-sure certifiable. Maybe the dude had a habit of coming home late and got tired of being betrayed by a squeaking floor. Maybe the dude’s wife laid down an ultimatum connecting the squeaky floor and deprivation of marital favors. I don’t know.

What I do know is that at some point, someone grabbed a hammer and a bag of nails and started pounding away. In one place in the hallway, I counted thirty-two nails in one square foot area. In a few other places, only slightly fewer. Living room, dining room, both bedrooms. Wham! Wham! Wham! Maybe it wasn’t a hammer; maybe the guy had a pneumatic nail gun. And we’re not talking six-penny finishing nails with tiny heads that almost disappear into the flooring. No siree Bob! These are heavy framing nails with heads the size of beaver tails, buddy. Serious stuff.

I’ve love to refinish these floors, sand them down smooth, apply a hand-rubbed Golden Oak stain and three coats of varnish. They’d be awesome. Lovely. Warm, homey and comforting. But I’ve seen what a single nail can do a sanding belt on a big drum sander and I know how much they cost. I also know what it’s like trying to pull old nails out of solid hardwood. Sometimes the wood will splinter around the nail as it’s being pulled out. You can also tear loose the flooring.

Like a lot of other situations in life, it’s often not the people who create the mess who end up trying to deal with it. But I also know what it’s like to have some circumstance drive you to doing things that you and everyone who loves you end up regretting. So, I think I’ll try to cut the guy some slack and figure things just got really out of whack for him and he did what he thought would make things better. Or at least what he thought would make him feel better. I’ve been there, done that and would like to not get another one of those tee shirts.

Sometimes, learning to live with a particular thing leaves fewer scars than trying to fix it. No matter how big your hammer is.

H. Arnett
3/17/16

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Better than Twitter

Posted on March 10, 2016 by Doc Arnett

In this age of instantaneous communication, we have the power to almost touch millions with a few touches of the screen and a “Send” command. We can text message a group of “friends,” and then use “Reply All” to bounce our slight thoughts around the planet. It is fast, easy and above all things, convenient.

Phone calls can get prolonged, email exchanges protracted and even twitting or tweeting has elements of over-engagement. Digital communication has unlocked doors, broken down barriers and shrunk the planet.

But there is yet no replacement for direct interaction and real touch.

I was reminded of this yesterday when I made a short drive out to the local hospital for a short visit with one of our teachers. Her husband opened the door after I knocked. I saw the teacher sitting up on the bed, her mother seated to the side. Obviously, the patient had improved since her admission over the weekend due to intense abdominal pain. Her perspective on that was that it exceeded the pain of birthing three children. I was in no position to argue the point and was inclined to take her word on it.

We visited for a few minutes and I assured her, per instructions from her department chairperson, that her colleagues’ schedules were permitting them to fill in for her and take care of all her classes. (That sort of thing is a hallmark of faculty caring for each other and their students and is part of what makes Cowley College a great place.) “They’ve been great,” she responded with an expression of sincere appreciation.

As I was getting ready to leave, I asked if it would be okay for me to pray with them. They all responded enthusiastically and we gathered around the bed, joined hands and solicited God’s blessings—on her, all those who attend to her and to her family and loved ones. After closing the prayer, I wiped my eyes and looked at each of them and thanked them for the privilege of praying with them. I shook hands with the mother and the husband. The teacher got out of bed and hugged me.

The strength of her hug and the look in her eyes as she thanked me again almost moved me to tears. You don’t get that with a wireless connection.

H. Arnett
3/10/16

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